Public value of science

Faced with concerns from the science community about increasingly prominent anti-science sentiment and the associated challenge to evidence-informed science for policy, the public value of science project is interrogating thinking on how perceptions of science inform policy, with the aim of enabling research institutions to use the findings that emerge.

Public value of science

Supported by an expert panel, the project has three foci: understanding, enabling and extending scientific engagement.

The Occasional Paper Public Perceptions and Understandings of Science, published in October 2021, takes a global perspective which aims to stimulate discussion among science academies and unions.


Public perceptions and understandings of science

From international contexts to institutional responses.


The podcast series ‘How To Talk About Science’, released in late 2021, is based on a series of conversations with members of the expert panel on how research institutions address issues related to identity, distrust, uncertainty and alternative knowledge systems in their science communication.


A series of webinars called ‘Talk Back Better’ to be held in 2022 will address how to engage constituencies who are hesitant about or resistant to the scientific consensus.

Next: Unlocking science: An ISC-BBC Storyworks partnership


Image by Kelly Teller on Unsplash

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